No change in city's credit is good news to Emanuel

Mayor pleased ratings didn't slide

No news is good news when it comes to the city's bond ratings, Mayor Rahm Emanuel said Tuesday after three bond rating agencies affirmed the city's credit status.

A week after Emanuel introduced his proposed 2012 budget, Fitch Ratings, Standard & Poor's and Moody's Investors Service issued statements saying the city maintained its "stable" credit outlook and its bond ratings were unchanged from last fall. The agencies usually provide ratings before a large municipal bond issue, and the city is about to issue more than $900 million worth in the next month.

"I'm pleased that we did not get downgraded," Emanuel said at an unrelated news conference.

The mayor said he viewed the rating news as an "affirmation that with our 2012 budget proposal we are on the right track."

His press office took it a step further, issuing a release touting the agencies' decisions not to downgrade the city's credit rating and saying it "potentially saved taxpayers approximately $30 million over the next 20 years."

Before he presented his budget to the City Council, Emanuel met with each rating agency to outline his plans to address the city's structural deficit and halt its reliance on one-time fixes, the mayor's office said.

All three rating firms praised the administration for its budget balancing efforts.